We Merry Mutants
by Hvitr istalri
Summary: When Max and the flock meet three strange children who claim to be like them, how will they react? And when they offer to help Max save the world, can Max unbend her pride enough to accept it?  Apparently I still suck at summaries. T for future content
1. Chapter 1

Yay! New story! Don't forget to let me know what you think! :D

**P.S. When I reread this, I realized that I forgot to mention the name of my main OC. It's Alex. So, now you know.**

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***ALEX'S POV***

"Okay, guys, this way," said Max. The flock followed her into an alley.

I was hiding behind a dumpster, waiting with my friends Aidan and Joren. We had been tailing Max and the flock for 2 days, waiting for the right time to approach them.

We were...like them. Wings and all. All meaning the whole 'crazy-scientists-and-wolf-thingies-after-us' package. We wanted to join up with the flock, maybe together we could defeat Itex and the whitecoats and, you know, save the world.

I stepped out from behind the dumpster, surprising Max. She didn't freak out, but I sensed a change, a subtle shift in her stance. She was ready to fight if need be. "Who are you?" she asked, clearly confused.

"A friend." I replied. "Chill, we aren't going to cause any trouble. Just hear me out." She didn't say anything, so I continued.

"We have been following you for a while now, hoping to join you. My friends and I want to help you with your quest." In my excitement I had taken a step forward, causing Max to go into battle mode. She lashed out with both fists, catching me in my stomach. I sucked in air, probably looking like a fish out of water. Max lashed out with her right hand and I leaned back, avoiding her fist but causing her to smash it into a blue metal dumpster. Ouch. I dodged a kick aimed at my head and whirled around behind Max, grabbing her shoulders. "Stop!" I shouted. She threw me off. I stumbled forward, my back towards her.

Then my world went white with pain.

Max had slammed her combat-booted foot right into my back, crushing my right wing bone. I screamed in agony, feeling like my whole wing was on fire. Max was standing over me. Joren shoved her away.

Fang stepped up to him. They glared at each other. "Now isn't the time for a showdown, Joren," I hissed through clenched teeth. Aidan knelt down beside me and eased my jacket off.

Slowly and painfully, I unfolded my wings. Not to brag, but my wings are _awesome_. A fourteen foot span of jet black feathers, the glossiest black you've ever seen. Well, when they aren't covered in dirt or, say, mangled by a large scuffed combat boot. For instance.

Dimly, I saw Max's eyes widen. I smiled. "Not what you expected, huh, Max?" I said weakly. I struggled to my feet. Reaching up to touch my crushed wingbone, I closed my eyes. Concentrating hard, I felt the familiar rush of energy surging through my fingertips, making my whole arm tingle. Suddenly, my wing didn't hurt anymore. I sighed and dropped to my knees, using enough energy to heal my wing left me too tired to stand.

Hm. I guess I forgot to mention that I can do that.

Pretty cool, huh? I can manipulate energy to speed up the healing process. Unfortunately, the energy has to come from my own body. Doing big things like healing my wing takes a _lot_ of energy. Cuts and bruises, I can heal without a problem.

It's just one of those random mutation things. It happens to the best of us.

Max looked confused. "What—what just happened?" I looked up.

"I healed myself. It's like a...a power, that I have. A mutation. I can heal all sorts of injuries, no matter how bad." I could tell Max was trying not to look impressed.

"Way cool!" came a voice from behind Max. "So you could, uh, maybe heal a burn?" It was Gazzy. Max turned around. "And where did you get a burn? Have you been building bombs again?" Gazzy blushed. That darn kid.

Rising to my feet, I tried again. "Max, we want to help you. I know you are, to put it bluntly, _extremely _mistrustful. So am I. But we have to work together on this. I'm serious. We can only defeat Itex together." She glared at me. I had to win her over, fast, or there wasn't going to be another chance.

"Look, Max, I swear I don't have anything to do with the School. Or the Institute, or the Administration. Nothing at all. I hate them as much as you do. We have every right to hate them." Max looked surprised at the mention of the Administration. Well, it wasn't that uncommon, my friends and I were probably three out of maybe, I don't know, five other outsiders who knew of the ultra-secret organization. Well, three out of five outsiders that were still alive, anyways.

Max still hadn't responded. The rest of the flock wore guarded expressions, no doubt waiting for some signal from Max. She stood there mutely, staring me down. I looked back at her, trying to look earnest. As it turns out, I don't do earnest very well.

"You say we can trust you. You say you're on our side, you want to help. Well, here's the thing. We don't trust anyone but ourselves." Max crossed her arms across her chest. Inwardly, I sighed. Against all my hope, this was going exactly the way I thought it would.

"Thanks for the offer, but I think we can make it on our own." Max turned around, motioning for the others to follow her. I stood quietly as I watched them disappear around a corner and listened to their footsteps echo in the narrow alleyway.

"Are we just going to let them go?" asked Joren. I shrugged wearily, rolling my shoulders to work out some of the stiffness in my newly healed wing. "We can't just let them go. They'll have to work with us eventually, whether they like it or not." I tried to sound confident, but I didn't think it worked all that well. We were all tired, having tailed the flock for a while. We took turns watching the flock while the others slept so they didn't move off when we were happily sawing logs in a tree somewhere. In the past two days, each of us had probably only gotten about six good hours of rest.

"Can we get something to eat?" asked Aidan. A loud grumbling noise emanated from the general area of her midsection, emphasizing her question. "Sure," I said. "Where do you want to go?" I had about twenty dollars in my back pocket, earned off some guy in the street who was stupid enough to bet that I couldn't beat him in a race. Really, twenty valuable bucks wasted on an idiotic bet with a complete stranger. Maybe I was just used to having no money.

"Let's just go to a gas station and buy as much junk food we can afford," suggested Joren. I liked that idea. We headed for the nearest gas station, weaving through traffic both vehicular and pedestrian. I spotted a BP right across the street from a Shell Station. The BP was nearly deserted, while the Shell Station was fairly busy. I wondered why that was. We headed into the BP, avoiding all the people at the Shell Station. I passed a few people on the way, most of which gave me dirty looks as I headed for the BP. Weird.

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In the gas station, I told Aidan and Joren to get what they wanted, but not to go crazy. "Yes, mother," they said in unison, rolling their eyes. I glared at them. Aidan rushed to the shelf with the Hershey bars, while Joren headed straight for the beef jerky. I swear, that boy would eat beef jerky for breakfast, lunch, and dinner every day if he had the chance.

We took our purchases up to the register. The cashier lady gave us a strange look, but thankfully didn't ask any questions. Once outside, Joren stuffed to food into his backpack and we went to go find a nice place in the woods somewhere to eat.

We strode briskly through the woods on the outskirts of town. I thrust my hands in my pockets, noting the chill in the air. We would have to go find some jackets soon. And by "find", I meant buy. Well, I hoped.

Aiden found a clearing some distance into the woods and we stopped to unpack. My sharp ears picked up the slightest snapping of a twig somewhere off to my left. I froze, the others did the same. I turned to the noise just as more crackling noises came from my right. I straightened, adrenaline pumping through my veins. My hands clenches and unclenched, ready to punch stuff.

A team of tall, wolflike humanoids with glinting fangs and powerful-looking muscles strode with easy grace into the clearing. They made a circle around us. Aidan, Joren, and I stood back to back, watching the Erasers carefully. A few of them snarled, but they made no move to attack.

Two Erasers stepped aside, allowing a third Eraser to enter the ring of feral mutants. The newcomer was more muscular than the rest, with sleek fur and long, sharp teeth. I stared into his deep black eyes, daring him to do something. I was so pumped up I was ready to shred anything that moved.

He pulled the side of his mouth up in a half-grin, half-snarl and winked at me. My eyes widened in recognition.

"Dante," I hissed through tight lips. He grinned, showing off his dazzlingly white teeth. I could barely suppress my fury.

"Miss me?" He laughed, and the other Erasers joined in. It was the most chilling sound I had ever heard.

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**Whatcha think? I don't really know where I'm going to go with this story yet, so I guess I'll just take it and run! XD **

**But I do know one thing I'm gonna do at a point later in the story, and I'll give you a hint: It does **_**nooot **_**include Iggy. Or my OC Alex. Wink wink, cough cough.**

**So, you know what I'm going to ask you to do now. REVIEW! Uh, please. d;P (in case you are wondering what this is, it's a guy wearing a baseball cap winking and sticking his tongue out. And for those of you who **_**did**_** know what that was right off the bat, well, you're awesomer than The Miz. And that's saying something.) **


	2. Chapter 2

**Kay. Well, nothing much to put here, so..**

"Aw, Dante, couldn't you have come a little later? I was just about to eat my long-awaited bag of Cheetos," I said, trying to keep my voice casual. I wasn't afraid—not of these wackjobs, anyway. I just tried to keep the sarcastic tone out of my voice because experience proved that the more comfortable you seemed, the angrier Dante and his cronies got. Which was a good thing, because angry Erasers make mistakes. And sadly, my friends and I were not very forgiving of mistakes.

He sneered. "I couldn't wait to see you, Alex. It's been what, four years? Five? Much too long for old friends to be apart." His pep team sniggered. I crossed my arms. "Friends? Since when did that term apply to you? Oh, maybe it was after that time you hit me so hard I was unconscious for a week. Or, the time when you set that shed on fire after trapping us inside. I still have the stupid scar from that exciting little venture." Dante cocked his head. "Oh, there were some rough patches, but I think we have a pretty solid relationship, don'tcha think?"

I felt fury rising within me. "Rough patches? Solid relationship? Are you—oh, forget this." Without warning, I sprang at the nearest Eraser, lashing out with my foot. I drove my heel into his neck and he dropped like a stone. Aidan and Joren leapt into action only a second behind me, dispatching Erasers with practiced ease. I was pleased with my fighting prowess and reflexes; they were surprisingly good after so long without a real fight.

I looked around. There were about five Erasers left, six including Dante. I punched one in the jaw and quickly took him out with a roundhouse to the head. Aidan and Joren seemed to be holding up pretty well, so I let them have the remaining Erasers.

Growling, I jumped toward Dante. He met me head-on, grinning ferociously. I ducked his first kick and tackled him to the ground, pinning his arms under his thick torso. He struggled, but I managed to hold him down. I pummeled him mercilessly in the face, until he managed to wrench a paw-hand thing free and shove me off.

He was really strong, stronger than I was. I called to Aidan and Joren and we sprang into the air, pumping our wings furiously. Taking off with no running start was hard, but we managed to get airborne without incident. Rising over the treetops, I looked down at the clearing. The ground was all churned up and Eraser bodies were strewn everywhere. I saw Dante struggle to his feet.

"This isn't over!" he screamed to the sky. "You can't hide from us! We _will _find you!" I ignored him and sped off into the sky.

Heading forward, I tried to keep myself calm. Despite my anger, I was freaked about seeing Dante again after all this time. I cleared my head and told myself that I would ponder it later. The adrenaline from the fight was wearing off, and I had to concentrate on not falling asleep in the air. When we had flown quite a ways from the site of the Eraser attack, I pointed out a large grove of oak trees. "Let's land there, and then we can eat."

"Oh, thank God," said Aidan, immediately angling her body toward the trees. I shared the feeling. I was so tired, I thought I might pass out right then.

Upon spying a thick branch that was pretty high up, I sighed with relief. Dropping down onto it, I folded my wings and landed in a crouch. I tilted sideways and gripped the branch to keep from falling. Joren handed my my cheetos and a Dr. Pepper. I made slurping noises as I downed the soft drink and demolished the cheetos in what must have been record time.

Taking deep breaths, I leaned back against the trunk of the great oak. "I'll take first watch," volunteered Joren. "Thanks," I said wearily, not even trying to argue. I knew I probably should be taking first watch, since I was the leader and all, but I was so tired I probably wouldn't be very alert. My eyelids drooped and I let my fatigue overwhelm me.

***MAXS POV***

Up in the boughs of a huge old maple tree, I closed my eyes and attempted to collect my thoughts. The three kids who had confronted us it the alleyway had had wings. The girl, the one that was apparently the the leader, wanted to help me with my world-saving thing. We probably could use the help, but I was too stubborn to accept it. Some part of me wanted to be the only hero, wanted to do it alone.

I rubbed my head with my left hand, the other one still sore from puching that dumpster. She was fast; I had to give her that. But how was I supposed to know if I could trust her? What if this was another sick plot of the whitecoats, and they were going to lead us straight into a trap?

_You can trust them, Max._ The Voice, back from…wherever it went. _Well, Voice, haven't heard from you in a while, _I thought._ Had a nice vacation? _The Voice hadn't imparted any pearls of wisdom lately, and I had been a little nervous at its silence. Not that I would ever say as much.

_They mean you no harm. She was not lying when she said they had no connection to the school, _The Voice continued. I didn't reply. If the Voice was right, then I had injured, rejected, and most likely pissed off a potential and powerful ally. _Three _potential and powerful allies. Crap.

Well, there wasn't much I could do about it, unless the girl and her friends decided to track us down again. They didn't seem to have that much of a problem doing it the first time. Right now, I was too exhausted to care. Whatever happened, I would deal with it in the morning.

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**:( Only one review! Are my stories that crappy? Am I that bad a writer?**

**Maybe I should just stop writing...:-(**

**And I will, cause one review isn't exactly encouraging... DX**


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